Jasmine didn’t look happy yesterday afternoon and I thought that maybe she had an egg problem. I wondered if she was about to lay a soft shelled egg. At bedtime she was perched in her usual spot but looked odd with her tail raised. I hoped she would lay an egg first thing in the morning and bounce back.
Jasmine didn’t lay this morning and still didn’t look at all happy. After the morning sunflower seeds she went to her bedtime spot in the chicken shed. Although she was on her bedtime perch rather than in a nest box I recognised this from when she laid her last egg.
Jasmine is not happy
Jasmine laid her first tiny egg on 18th January. She laid it early in the morning from her roost spot. A week later I felt she was about to lay her next egg but she kept going to this same bedtime spot from where she had laid her first egg.
I lifted her down and put her in the nest box where she stayed put. Later she laid another egg which was bigger than her first tiny egg but still smaller than the usual serama sized egg.
Today I lifted her down again and put her in the nest box but she didn’t stay and went to perch on the ladder where there was some sun. She sat dozing in the sun.
Jasmine dozing in the sun
At this point I was torn as to whether it was an egg problem or was mycoplasma. It seemed more likely to be an egg problem but sometimes the symptoms can be the same. Freckles would doze in this position when she had myco. I decided to wait and see if she laid today before making the decision to treat with tylan again.
Since the freezing temperatures at the weekend I had seen Dandelion with a bubble in her eye on one occasion for the first time this winter. She soon blinked it away and I decided to just keep an eye on her. Today Dandelion was on the perch above Jasmine and I noticed she had a slight crust over her right eyelid. This was something that used to happen last winter.
When I next checked Dandelion had scratched the crust away. This added to me being unsure if it was an egg problem with Jasmine or myco. I decided to treat with tylan tomorrow if Jasmine didn’t lay but at that point she went to the nest box.
Dandelion has a crust over her right eye
Jasmine in the nest box
To my relief when I next checked Jasmine was back out in the run looking her usual self again. There was an egg in the nest box of a bigger size than her previous egg. I think she had been struggling to lay a bigger egg but it had a good shell.
Today’s eggs
On the right is Ebony’s large egg and next is Spangle’s egg which is always a beige colour like Ebony’s. Next is Marmite’s pale egg and on the left is Jasmine’s, bigger and rounder, pale egg. This is probably why she was having difficulty getting it laid.
It is a week and a half since her last egg so she is obviously getting started slowly. Hopefully she will soon get the hang of it. Another crises has passed and hopefully all is back to normal once more.
Click here to see the history of my flock.
Thank goodness She is ok again.
I agree. Just when I think it’s all going smoothly something rocks the boat. I worried yesterday and today and now all seems resolved once more. They do like to worry us!
What a relief!! xx
It is a huge relief. xx
I do hope that things settle down for her; reading this made me think of Amber’s difficulties when she was laying and it’d be something you’d not like to see again. Fingers crossed!
It made me think of Amber too, which is why I wondered if a soft shelled egg was on it’s way. In the end it wasn’t but look at the roundness and width of her egg. After two tiny eggs this was actually a whopper. I think the width may have made it difficult to pass. Something else I haven’t come across before, when I picked it up, it left a white powder in my hand. I am hopeful that with practise she will be fine.
I am surprised that Vanilla and Sienna haven’t shown any interest in the nest boxes yet. I suppose they all mature at slightly different rates. I would like to think that egg laying difficulties are a thing of the past but of course we never know what they will throw at us.